Download or read book An overview of migration in Myanmar Findings from the Myanmar Household Welfare Survey written by Myanmar Agriculture Policy Support Activity (MAPSA) and published by Intl Food Policy Res Inst. This book was released on 2023-03-31 with total page 43 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This paper provides evidence on the extent and characteristics of migration in Myanmar between December 2021 and June 2022. We use data from three rounds of the Myanmar Household Welfare Survey (MHWS), a nationally and regionally representative phone survey, to analyze migration patterns in Myanmar. The data highlights a complex situation, where there is both new migration, that is driven by conflict, and more traditional migration, that is driven by a search for better employment both within Myanmar and abroad. We find that approximately 3.6 million individuals or 6.5 percent of the population of Myanmar moved over the 6-month study period. Between December 2021 and June 2022 fleeing direct conflict was the primary driver of migration for as many as 604 thousand individuals. During the same period, approximately 2 million individuals moved in search of a job for themselves or a family member. Finally, Chin, Yangon, and Rakhine had the highest rates of migration.

Download or read book Remittances and household welfare Findings from the Myanmar Household Welfare Survey MHWS written by Myanmar Agriculture Policy Support Activity (MAPSA) and published by Intl Food Policy Res Inst. This book was released on 2023-07-27 with total page 33 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Remittances are a critical source of household income in Myanmar and are significantly associated with positive welfare outcomes. In 2022, 33 percent of the households surveyed in the Myanmar Household Welfare Survey (MHWS) received remittances at least once in the twelve-month period. Remittances made up 7 percent of the average monthly per capita income of households in 2022. Among households that received remittances, 40 percent of their average monthly per capita income was from remittances. Considerably more households received remittances in 2022, compared to 2017, the last year for which there is nationally representative data (World Bank 2017). Despite the increase in the number of households receiving remittances, compared to 2017, the income share from remittances has decreased for all households. Even with internal lockdowns and border closures because of the COVID-19 pandemic, remittance senders migrated internally in 2020 and 2021. As a result, domestic remittance flows appear to have increased steadily since 2012. International remittance flows, on the other hand, decreased substantially during the first two years of the pandemic. They are now increasing rapidly. In 2022, households in Rakhine, Chin, Mon, and Kayin received the most remittances of the states/regions. Households in Chin, Kayin, Tanintharyi, and Mon received a greater percentage of remittances from international senders rather than domestic senders. Most international remittance flows were from Thailand, Malaysia, and China. Households in Kachin, Ayeyarwady, and Mandalay received the most remittances from domestic senders. Most domestic remittance flows were from Yangon, Mandalay, and Shan. Receiving remittances has a positive and significant association with improved welfare outcomes. Households that receive remittances are less likely to have lower income compared with last year and more likely to have a better food consumption score and a higher dietary diversity score. Households who receive remittances use fewer coping strategies. Finally, households who receive remittances are more likely to have an improved house made of brick, brick/wood, or semi-pucca.

Download or read book Urban proximity conflict and agricultural development Evidence from Myanmar written by Steinhübel, Linda and published by Intl Food Policy Res Inst. This book was released on 2023-07-27 with total page 40 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Urbanization and violent conflict have been two global trends gaining more and more momentum in recent years. This has important implications for agricultural development, which unfortunately are still not well understood. Urban proximity is generally associated with agricultural intensification and improved market participation, while farming systems in remote areas are characterized by larger shares of subsistence production. Such differences along the remoteness gradient likely also play a role in how conflict exposure affects agricultural production. That is, we must assume that the effect of conflict on agricultural development is location-dependent—a fact that is generally neglected in empirical analysis. We address this gap by drawing from a unique nationally representative data set of 2,292 paddy farmers in Myanmar and estimating the effect of conflict exposure and travel times on agricultural production during the monsoon season of 2021. By applying multivariate additive models, we allow for nonlinear and interacted effects of conflict exposure and urban proximity, thereby explicitly exploring spatial variation in the effect of conflict exposure. We find strong positive effects of urban proximity on paddy rice intensification and sales, while conflict exposure has disproportionately negative effects in direct proximity to urban centers and very remote areas. For agricultural development—and smallholder incomes in general—this means that productive areas, on the one hand, and the poorest areas of the country, on the other hand, are especially affected by conflict.

Download or read book Vulnerability and welfare Findings from the fourth round of the Myanmar Household Welfare Survey October to December 2022 written by Myanmar Agriculture Policy Support Activity (MAPSA) and published by Intl Food Policy Res Inst. This book was released on 2023-04-28 with total page 49 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The fourth round of the Myanmar Household Welfare Survey (MHWS), a nationally and regionally representative phone survey, was implemented between October and December 2022. It follows from three rounds that were carried out quarterly beginning in December 2021. This report discusses the findings from the fourth round related to shocks, coping strategies, and income poverty. The security situation in Myanmar continued to deteriorate during the fourth-round recall period. Increasingly, households felt insecure in their communities, as reported by 22 percent of rural households and 27 percent of urban households, an increase compared to the previous rounds. This is because crime and violence continued to increase, affecting 12 and 8 percent of communities, respectively. Further, 8 percent of households were directly affected, either through violence against a household member, robbery, or appropriation and/or destruction of their assets. Households faced multiple disruptions besides insecurity. Disruptions in banking, internet, and electricity also negatively affected household wellbeing and livelihoods. Further, households struggled to receive medical services. Finally, while school attendance recovered, it was still under 70 percent in some states/regions. Eighty-four percent of households used at least one coping strategy to meet daily needs during the month prior to the fourth-round survey. The three most common coping strategies used were spending savings, reducing non-food expenditure, and reducing food expenditure. This has been consistent across rounds. Further, some households exhausted some or all of their coping strategies. Remittances were the only factor inversely associated with households’ probability of having lower income compared to last year, being income poor, and using coping strategies. In R4 income-based poverty increased by 30 percent compared to R1 (15 percentage points) and 7 percent compared to R3 (4 percentage points). Sixty-six percent of the population was income poor. The rise in income poverty between R3 and R4 was largely attributable to changes in urban poverty. Casual wage-earning households, both farm and non-farm, had the highest levels of income poverty. Compared to the other states/regions, households in Kayah, Chin, and Sagaing were the most vulnerable. They were more likely to be impacted by conflict, have income loss, and be income poor. Despite reporting comparatively less conflict, households in Rakhine were also vulnerable; nearly 80 percent of households in Rakhine were income poor and many were mortgaging/selling assets to cope.

Download or read book Vulnerability and welfare Findings from the third round of the Myanmar Household Welfare Survey July and August 2022 written by Myanmar Agriculture Policy Support Activity and published by Intl Food Policy Res Inst. This book was released on 2022-11-22 with total page 41 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The third round of the Myanmar Household Welfare Survey (MHWS), a nationally and regionally representative phone survey, was implemented between July and August 2022. It followed from a second round that was conducted between April and June 2022 and a first round that was carried out between December 2021 and February 2022. This report discusses the findings from the third round related to shocks, coping strategies, and income poverty. During the third round of data collection, the security situation in Myanmar continued to decline. Increasingly, households felt insecure in their communities, as reported by 21 percent of rural households and 25 percent of urban households, an increase compared to previous rounds. This is because crime and violence continued to increase, affecting 10 and 8 percent of communities, respectively. Further, 6 percent of households were directly affected, either through violence against a household member, robbery, or appropriation and/or destruction of their assets. Households also continued to earn less income. In July and August of 2022, 46 percent of households reported lower income compared to the previous year. Disruptions in banking, internet, and electricity also negatively impact household wellbeing and livelihoods. Further, households struggled to receive medical services. Finally, while school attendance recovered, it was still under 50 percent in some states/regions. Eighty-two percent of households used at least one coping strategy to meet daily needs during the month prior to the third-round survey. The three most common coping strategies used were spending savings, reducing non-food expenditure, and reducing food expenditure. Further, some households exhausted some or all of their coping strategies. Finally, income poverty increased during the third round; 62 percent of households were income poor. Casual wage earning and asset poor households were particularly vulnerable. Compared to the other states/regions, households in Kayah and Chin were the most vulnerable. They were more likely to be impacted by conflict, have income loss, and be income poor. Households in Rakhine, Kachin, and Tanintharyi were also vulnerable; more than 70 percent of households in those regions were income poor.

Download or read book The state of food security and nutrition in Myanmar Findings from the Myanmar Household Welfare Survey 2021 2022 written by Myanmar Agriculture Policy Support Activity (MAPSA) and published by Intl Food Policy Res Inst. This book was released on 2022-12-07 with total page 19 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this research note, we provide an overview of the state of food security and nutrition in Myanmar using a recently collected household dataset. We examine food security using a household hunger scale and a food consumption score. To examine the state of nutrition, we examine the diet quality of individuals across Myanmar for three separate but important sections of population: (1) adults (18+ years), (2) women of reproductive age (15-49 years), and (3) children (6-23 and 6-59 months). We explore these indicators using three rounds of the Myanmar Household Welfare Survey (MHWS) collected over the phone in the first three quarters of 2022 – hereafter Q1, Q2 and Q3 – among over 12,000 households in 310 townships of Myanmar. MWHS is a nationally, urban/rural and state/region representative phone survey (MAPSA 2022a). We use standard food security and diet diversity measures for each of the three subpopulations to examine trends over the three rounds as well as explore heterogeneity with respect to gender, location of residence, and asset and income-based welfare indicators. We also look at disaggregated consumption of the different food groups that constitute the diet diversity measures to investigate the change in the consumption pattern of individuals. Finally, we use regression analysis to look at predictors of food insecurity and inadequate diet diversity, including household wealth and income, self reported shocks, food prices, and household characteristics.

Download or read book Vulnerability and welfare Findings from the fifth round of the Myanmar Household Welfare Survey March June 2023 written by Myanmar Agriculture Policy Support Activity (MAPSA) and published by Intl Food Policy Res Inst. This book was released on 2023-10-02 with total page 58 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The fifth round of the Myanmar Household Welfare Survey (MHWS), a nationally and regionally representative phone survey, was implemented between March and June 2023. It follows from four rounds that were carried out quarterly beginning in December 2021. This report discusses the findings from the fifth round related to livelihoods, shocks, asset and income poverty, and coping strategies.

Download or read book The state of food security and Nutrition in Myanmar 2022 23 Findings from six rounds of the Myanmar Household Welfare Survey written by Myanmar Agricultural Policy Support Activity and published by Intl Food Policy Res Inst. This book was released on 2024-02-27 with total page 32 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This working paper explores the state of food security and nutrition in Myanmar using 6 rounds of nationally representative household panel data collected from December 2021 to November 2023. Overall, the state of food security and nutrition has deteriorated in Myanmar in 2022-23. More than 3 percent of households were in moderate to severe hunger in September-November 2023. Hunger was highest in Chin (8.7 percent) and Tanintharyi (7.0 percent). Households with a low food consumption score increased from 9.4 percent in December 2021-February 2022 to 15.9 percent in October-December 2022 and remained high at 14.4 percent in September-November 2023. The shares in September-November 2023 were highest in Chin (38.2 percent), Kayah (22.4 percent), and Magway (20 percent). Inadequate diet diversity among adults rose from 20.6 percent to 30.9 percent over December 2021-February 2022 to October-December 2022, with an increase of 5.9 percentage points in the past one year. Women saw a faster decline in diet quality from December-February 2022 to September-November 2023 (12.1 percentage points increase in poor diet quality vs 8.4 percentage points for men). Decreases in diet quality among adults are driven by lower consumption of milk and dairy products as well as Vitamin A rich fruits, meat, fish, and eggs. 34.5 percent of all children aged 6-23 months and nearly a quarter (23.6 percent) of all children aged 6-59 months had inadequate diet quality in the latest round of survey. Regression analysis reveals low income and limited assets to be important risk factors for food security and adequate diet quality. Wage workers and low wage communities are found to be particularly vulnerable. Rising food prices, conflict and physical insecurity increase the likelihood of poor diet quality. Receiving remittances is a source of resilience; remittance-receiving households are less likely to experience hunger or poor dietary diversity at the household, adult, and child level. To avert a full-blown nutrition crisis in Myanmar, effective multisectoral steps are required to protect nutritionally vulnerable populations. Expanded implementation of nutrition- and gender sensitive social protection programs, including maternal and child cash transfers, particularly to vulnerable groups is called for. Further, given the importance of remittances as an effective coping mechanism, supporting migration and the flow of remittances would help to improve the welfare of the Myanmar population.

Download or read book The state of food security and nutrition in Myanmar 2022 Findings from four rounds of the Myanmar Household Welfare Survey written by Myanmar Agriculture Policy Support Activity (MAPSA) and published by Intl Food Policy Res Inst. This book was released on 2023-04-24 with total page 25 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The state of food security and nutrition has deteriorated in Myanmar in 2022. Four percent of households were in moderate to severe hunger in October/December 2022. Hunger was highest in Chin (10%), Mon (6.8%), and Kayin (6%). Households with a low food consumption score increased from 9.4% in December 2021/February 2022 to 15.7% in October/December 2022. The shares in October/December were highest in Chin (48.3%), Kayin (23.1%), and Magway (22.7%). Inadequate diet diversity among adults rose from 20.6% to 25.1% over the same period with rates higher for women, especially in rural areas. Decreases in diet quality among adults is driven by lower consumption of milk and dairy products as well as Vitamin A rich fruits, meat, fish, and eggs. More than a third of all children aged 6-23 months and 15.9% of all children aged 24-59 months have inadequate diet quality. Regression analysis reveals low income and limited assets to be important risk factors for food security and adequate diet quality. Wage workers and low wage communities are found to be particularly vulnerable. Rising food prices, conflict and physical insecurity increase the likelihood of poor diet quality. Receiving remittances is a source of resilience; remittance-receiving households are less likely to experience hunger or poor dietary diversity at the household, adult, and child level.

Download or read book Household migration during a time of crisis Patterns and outcomes in Myanmar written by Myanmar Agricultural Policy Support Activity and published by Intl Food Policy Res Inst. This book was released on 2024-03-04 with total page 36 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This study analyzes household migration, including paths, causes, challenges, and post-migration outcomes in Myanmar between February 2021 and July 2023 using the Myanmar Household Welfare Survey and the Myanmar Migration Assessment. During this period, we find that approximately ten percent of households in Myanmar migrated as a household or family unit. While nearly 40 percent of migration was urban-to-urban, a quarter was rural-to-rural, a quarter was rural-to-urban, and ten percent was urban-to-rural. Employment was the primary driver of household migration, with 54 percent of households citing it as their main reason for relocating. Other motivations included the desire to escape conflict and improve physical security (15 percent), to help family (12 percent), and for marriage (eight percent). In regions characterized by high conflict, such as Kayah, Chin, and Sagaing, a significant number of migrating households relocated due to conflict (70, 47, and 37 percent, respectively). Further, because of under-sampling of conflict areas, the number of migrants who moved due to conflict may be significantly higher. Households from high conflict regions often moved more than once before reaching their current destination. Decisions on where to migrate were significantly influenced by perceptions of employment opportunities (35 percent) and safety considerations (34 percent). Finding the money to migrate was challenging for most households. Sixty-two percent of households relied on savings to finance migration, while 14 percent of households relied on assistance from relatives. The study also analyzes post-migration outcomes. House ownership decreased significantly after migration from 65 percent to 28 percent. Instead, dwellings were either rented (34 percent) or stayed in for free (32 percent). Further, post-migration income sources changed. There was a significant increase in non-farm wage income and income from remittances and donations after the move. Almost two thirds of households reported improved safety and security conditions after the move. About half of the interviewed households felt that they had better opportunities to earn an income after moving. Nevertheless, access to furniture, clothing, and cooking materials decreased for a third of the households (35, 27, and 29 percent, respectively). Moreover, there were notable disparities between households migrating due to conflict and households who moved for other reasons, including less access to income, furniture, clothing, and cooking materials after the move for households displaced due to conflict.

Download or read book Myanmar s agrifood system Historical development recent shocks future opportunities written by Boughton, Duncan and published by Intl Food Policy Res Inst. This book was released on 2024-10-16 with total page 572 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Myanmar has endured multiple crises in recent years — including COVID-19, global price instability, the 2021 coup, and widespread conflict — that have disrupted and even reversed a decade of economic development. Household welfare has declined severely, with more than 3 million people displaced and many more affected by high food price inflation and worsening diets. Yet Myanmar’s agrifood production and exports have proved surprisingly resilient. Myanmar’s Agrifood System: Historical Development, Recent Shocks, Future Opportunities provides critical analyses and insights into the agrifood system’s evolution, current state, and future potential. This work fills an important knowledge gap for one of Southeast Asia’s major agricultural economies — one largely closed to empirical research for many years. It is the culmination of a decade of rigorous empirical research on Myanmar’s agrifood system, including through the recent crises. Written by IFPRI researchers and colleagues from Michigan State University, the book’s insights can serve as a to guide immediate humanitarian assistance and inform future growth strategies, once a sustainable resolution to the current crisis is found that ensures lasting peace and good governance.

Download or read book The state of food security and nutrition in Myanmar 2022 23 Findings from five rounds of the Myanmar Household Welfare Survey written by Myanmar Agricultural Policy Support Activity (MAPSA) and published by Intl Food Policy Res Inst. This book was released on 2023-10-27 with total page 28 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This working paper explores the state of food security and nutrition in Myanmar using 5 rounds of nationally representative household panel data collected from December 2021 to June 2023. Overall, the state of food security and nutrition has deteriorated in Myanmar in 2022-23. More than 3 percent of households were in moderate to severe hunger in April-June 2023. Hunger was highest in Chin (10.1 percent), Rakhine (7.6 percent), and Kayin (5.9 percent). Households with a low food consumption score increased from 9.4 percent in December 2021-February 2022 to 17.7 percent in April-June 2023. The shares in April-June were highest in Chin (48.4 percent), Kayah (27 percent), and Kachin (22 percent). Inadequate diet diversity among adults rose from 20.6 percent to 27.1 percent over the same period. Women saw a faster decline in diet quality from December-February 2022 to April-June 2022 (9.1 percentage points increase in poor diet quality vs 3.8 percentage points for men). Decreases in diet quality among adults are driven by lower consumption of milk and dairy products as well as Vitamin A rich fruits, meat, fish, and eggs. 40 percent of all children aged 6-23 months and nearly a quarter (24.9 percent) of children aged 6-59 months had inadequate diet quality in the latest round of survey. Regression analysis reveals low income and limited assets to be important risk factors for food security and adequate diet quality. Wage workers and low wage communities are found to be particularly vulnerable. Rising food prices, conflict and physical insecurity increase the likelihood of poor diet quality. Receiving remittances is a source of resilience; remittance-receiving households are less likely to experience hunger or poor dietary diversity at the household, adult, and child level. To avert a full-blown nutrition crisis in Myanmar, effective multisectoral steps are required to protect nutritionally vulnerable populations. Expanded implementation of nutrition- and gender-sensitive social protection programs, including maternal and child cash transfers, particularly to vulnerable groups is called for. Further, given the importance of remittances as an effective coping mechanism, supporting migration and the flow of remittances would help to improve the welfare of the Myanmar population.

Download or read book Livelihoods and Welfare Findings from the sixth round of the Myanmar Household Welfare Survey June November 2023 written by Myanmar Agriculture Policy Support Activity and published by Intl Food Policy Res Inst. This book was released on 2024-04-19 with total page 34 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The sixth round of the Myanmar Household Welfare Survey (MHWS), a nationally and regionally representative phone survey, was implemented between the end of August and November 2023. It follows five rounds that were carried out since the beginning of December 2021. This report discusses the findings from the sixth round related to livelihoods and welfare dynamics. The main findings are the following: Nationally, median real household income per adult equivalent declined by 15 percent between late 2022 and late 2023, indicating that the purchasing power of household income declined substantially over the previous year. Between late 2022 and late 2023, median real income per adult equivalent earned from farm wages increased slightly while real income earned from all other sources stagnated or declined. In late 2023, 13 percent of households had at least one jobless household member who in the three months before the survey spent at least one month seeking income generating work without finding it. The share of households with an unemployed member decreases by asset class (15 percent in asset poor households compared to 8 percent in asset rich households). Four percent of households had a child aged 5–11 who was employed at least one hour in any week in the three months before the survey and 8 percent of households had a child aged 12–14 who was employed at least 14 hours in any week during that period. Between late 2022 and 2023, there has been an overall reduction in household engagement in income earning activities. Except for other income sources (e.g., rent, remittances, and other forms of assistance), the share of households engaged in each income generating activity either declined or increased by a small, statistically insignificant amount. In every state/region, income poverty reached a new high in the period of August–November 2023 compared to all previous MHWS rounds in the last two years. Adjusted in accordance with food inflation, the poverty line increased by 35 percent between late 2022 and late 2023. A failure of nominal income to keep pace with this large jump in the poverty line led to an increase in the percentage of the population living in income-poor households by 17 percent from 62 percent in February–June 2023 to 72 in August–November 2023. Casual wage earning households continue to be the poorest livelihood group with income poverty rates of 90 and 84 percent in farm and non-farm wage earning households, respectively. Nonetheless, income poverty rose to 63 and 67 percent in households whose primary livelihoods are non-farm salary work and non-farm businesses—23 and 17 percent higher than a similar period in the previous year. Finally, over the same period, income poverty increased by 11 percent in farm households to 69 percent. Remittance income is an important stabilizing force. There are only a few factors helping households stay out of poverty, including earning income from salaried employment, migrating with the whole household, and receiving remittances. Individuals living in remittance receiving households are about 22 percentage points less poor compared to individuals in non-remittance receiving households. Households mainly reliant on ‘other’ forms of income, particularly remittances, are the most resilient livelihood group with poverty rates not changing between late 2022 and late 2023. In late 2023, households in Chin, Kayah, Rakhine, Sagaing, and Tanintharyi struggled most of all regions/states with income poverty, unemployment, and challenges to earning income. During that period, poverty headcounts were 93 percent in Chin, 87 percent in Kayah; and around 80 percent in Rakhine, Sagaing, and Tanintharyi. In Kayah, 49 percent of households reported a loss of employment in June–November 2023, while in Tanintharyi 39 percent of households reported a loss of employment. Further, nearly 30 percent of households in Kayah had an unemployed member—more than double the national average. Chin and Rakhine also had a large share of households with unemployed members. Finally, households in Chin were nearly twice as likely as other parts of the country to have employed children—children aged 5–11 were employed in 7 percent of households and children aged 12–14 were employed in 15 percent of households.

Download or read book Welfare and vulnerability Findings from the first round of the Myanmar Household Welfare Survey written by Myanmar Agriculture Policy Support Activity (MAPSA) and published by Intl Food Policy Res Inst. This book was released on 2022-06-02 with total page 28 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The first round of the Myanmar Household Welfare Survey (MHWS), a nationally and regionally representative phone survey, was implemented between December 2021 and February 2022 with 12,100 households. This report discusses its findings related to shocks, livelihoods, coping strategies and food security. We find that almost 1 in 5 households experience physical insecurity, more than 1 in 10 were negatively affected by climatic shocks, and 3 in 5 experienced sickness or death of household members in the past three months. Two thirds of households reported a lower income in the beginning of 2022 compared to 12 months earlier, indicating widespread impacts of the pandemic, the political crisis, and the ensuing economic crisis. Ninety percent of households applied at least one coping strategy to deal with lack of food or money during the past month. More than half of all households lowered food and non-food expenditures. A large number of households also used more dramatic coping strategies, including high-risk income generating activities (4 percent), children working (3 percent of households), migration (1 percent), or selling of the dwelling or land (1 percent). Even though data were collected in the beginning of 2022 after the monsoon harvest and thus a relatively favorable time of the year for food security, still 9 percent of the households did not have an adequate food consumption pattern and 4 percent suffered from moderate or severe hunger. Violent events in the township, self-reported physical insecurity, climatic and health shocks all are strongly associated with negative outcomes for income, coping and food security. Chin and Kayah state experienced high levels of violence and consistently perform worse across the range of welfare indicators considered.

Download or read book Shocks and coping Findings from the sixth round of the Myanmar Household Welfare Survey June November 2023 written by Myanmar Agriculture Policy Support Activity and published by Intl Food Policy Res Inst. This book was released on 2024-03-25 with total page 41 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The sixth round of the Myanmar Household Welfare Survey (MHWS), a nationally and regionally representative phone survey, was implemented between August and November 2023. It follows five rounds that were carried out since the beginning of December 2021. This report discusses the findings from the sixth round related to shocks and coping strategies. The security situation in Myanmar continued to deteriorate during the sixth-round recall period, which spanned from June to November 2023. Households felt insecure in their communities, as reported by 23 percent of households and had a low level of trust, as reported by 25 percent of households. This is because crime and violence continued to increase, affecting 20 and 10 percent of communities, respectively. Further, eight percent of households were directly affected by violence, either through violence against a household member, robbery, or appropriation and/or destruction of their assets. Lawlessness continues to rise in Myanmar. In June–November 2023, 21 percent of households reported a lot or some gambling in their community, 20 percent reported a high risk of burglary, theft, or robbery in their community, and 16 percent reported drug use. These issues were more prominent in urban areas, compared to rural areas. Another crucial challenge is that 15 percent of respondents felt that it was dangerous for them to move around and do everyday tasks in June–November 2023. Finally, three percent of respondents revealed that there was a risk of kidnapping in their community. The two states/regions where households felt the most insecure between June and November 2023 were Kayah and Chin. At the same time, the security situation in Rakhine, Tanintharyi, and Sagaing decreased the most compared to the same time last year. These areas witnessed the highest increases in lawlessness. While the lowest levels of reported insecurity continued to be in Ayeyarwady, Bago, and Nay Pyi Taw, these regions are still confronting much of the same risks as experienced across the country. Households faced multiple shocks besides insecurity. In June–November 2023, 19 percent of farm households reported being negatively impacted by at least one climatic shock. Intense wind was a major issue in Rakhine with 28 percent of households negatively impacted. Disruptions to the internet and electricity also negatively affected household wellbeing and livelihoods. For residents that accessed electricity from the national power grid, 55 percent of households had a power cut of at least one hour from 8:00 am to 8:00 pm all seven days of the week prior to the interview. Further, between June and November of 2023, almost half of the households (48 percent) did not have access to the internet regularly. Access to medical services and school enrolment improved at the end of 2023 compared to the end of 2022. The percentage of households who could never access medical services dropped from eight percent in July–December 2022 to two percent in June–November 2023. School enrollment improved from 79 percent of children aged 5 to 14 enrolled in July-December 2022 to 86 percent of children enrolled in June–November 2023. The rate of food inflation rose to 24 percent between March–June 2023 and September-November 2023, on average 5 percent per month. The prices of most foods in our survey increased considerably in the one-year period between October–December 2022 and September–November 2023, with median rice prices increasing by 75 percent. Further, the contribution of rice prices to the rising cost of the food inflation basket has become more 4 important over time. On the other hand, vegetable prices exhibited substantial volatility with large increases in prices between the third and fourth quarters of both 2022 and 2023. Seventy-five percent of households used at least one coping strategy to meet daily needs during the month prior to the sixth-round survey (June–November 2023). The three most common coping strategies used were spending savings, reducing non-food expenditure, and reducing food expenditure. This has been consistent across rounds. Further, some households exhausted some or all of their coping strategies. Thirty-five percent of households reported that they no longer have any savings to reduce. Finally, the number of households who borrowed money (30 percent) decreased significantly from the previous year (38 percent) but was still slightly higher than in the beginning of 2023. At the same time, 49 percent of households continued to be in debt.

Download or read book Those who leave and those who stay Individual migration in Myanmar during a time of crisis written by Myanmar Agriculture Policy Support Activity and published by Intl Food Policy Res Inst. This book was released on 2024-03-15 with total page 48 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Drawing on data from five rounds of the Myanmar Household Welfare Survey (MHWS) collected between December 2021 and June 2023 with more than 12,000 respondents per round, this report analyzes individual migration, migration in which one or a few household members leave the household. To complement this analysis, we utilize data from the Myanmar Migration Assessment, carried out in June and July 2023 in a sub-sample of MHWS households with household members who have migrated since 2013. Over the year and a half period, from December 2021 to June 2023 an estimated 6,451,394 household members 15 and older, 11.8 percent of the population and 19.9 percent of the adult population, left their households. Kayah had the highest percentage of migrants, followed by Kachin, Kayin, and Mon, with migration rates over 25 percent of the adult population. Significantly more men migrated than women. Over the period, more individuals left for work within Myanmar than for overseas work or for other reasons including marriage, education, or to join family. Using the Myanmar Migration Assessment sub-sample of 5,455 of individuals who have migrated since 2013, we analyze the migration process and destination characteristics. Most migrants in our sample only migrated once, 91 percent. Between 2021 and 2022, there was a huge jump in migration from 10 percent of the sample to 24 percent. Further, migration was already 23 percent of our sample in June 2023. Therefore, individual migration is likely to be much higher in 2023 than 2022. Between 2021 and 2023, most of the individual migration was internal, 79 percent versus 21 percent overseas. Internal migration and migration abroad are increasing at the same rate. Most internal migration was to Yangon, followed by Mandalay, and Shan. Around 27 percent of all individuals migrated to Yangon over the whole period. Migration to Mandalay decreased from 2010 to 2023, while migration to Shan increased. Migration abroad is mainly to Thailand and Malaysia. Most individuals migrated to find better employment. Employment was the most important driver of migration across all years, all destinations, all age groups, and for men and women. In 2021-2023, 34 percent of individuals left their homes to find more work opportunities, 18 percent left their home to find a higher paid job, and 7 percent left to find better working conditions. At the same time, an increasing number of individuals migrated for education, as well. In 2021-2023, 12 percent of migrants were household heads, most other migrants were either sons or daughters of the head. While between 2013 and 2016 only 44 percent of migrants had children when they migrated, in 2021-2023, 91 percent of migrants had children before they migrated. Overall, most migrants, regardless of their primary reason for migrating, had friends or relatives who had migrated to their destination before them, this includes 55 percent of internal migrants, and 58 percent of migrants abroad. Most migrants participated in most or all of the decisions to migrate. This was true for 85 percent of migrants that went abroad and 79 percent of migrants that remained within Myanmar. In Mandalay and Shan, fewer migrants fully participated in the decision to migrate.

Download or read book Resilience pathways Understanding remittance trends in post coup Myanmar written by Myanmar Agriculture Policy Support Activity and published by Intl Food Policy Res Inst. This book was released on 2024-03-04 with total page 39 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Remittances have emerged as an important source of income for households in post-coup Myanmar. This paper utilizes data from the second and fifth rounds of the Myanmar Household Welfare Survey (MHWS) to analyze remittance trends between January and June 2022 and the same period in 2023. This is supplemented with data from the Myanmar Migration Assessment (MMA) which was conducted with a sub-sample of MHWS households in June and July 2023. According to MHWS, between January and June 2023, 16 percent of households received remittances from at least one member who was residing overseas or in a different state or region. This comprises eight percent of households receiving remittances from migrants outside of Myanmar and ten percent of households receiving remittances from migrants within Myanmar. Around 12 percent of households received remittances from a single migrant and four percent of households received remittances from two or more members. Among households that received remittances from within Myanmar, they received on average 127,559 per month (about 61 USD). Households that received remittances from outside of Myanmar received around 395,835 per month (about 188 USD), significantly higher than the amount from migrants within Myanmar. Among remittance receiving households, remittances made up 39 percent of household income. Based on MMA data, most foreign migrants reside in Thailand and Malaysia while most domestic migrants reside in Yangon, Mandalay, or Shan. During the twelve-month period between June 2022 and July 2023, over 57 percent of migrants in the MMA sent money back to their households in Myanmar. A greater percentage of overseas migrants sent remittances, compared to migrants within Myanmar. Mobile money was the most common method for migrants within Myanmar to send money, with 70 percent sending money in this way. Instead, most migrants abroad relied on Myanmar banks, 47 percent of migrants. More than half of the households surveyed received the same level of remittances in 2022/2023 as in the previous year. Households received more remittances when migrants earned higher salaries and obtained new jobs, or when the household witnessed shifts in exchange rates or faced an increased need for remittances. Conversely, households received fewer remittances when migrants grappled with elevated living expenses, received lower salaries, or remained unemployed. The MMA data also highlights the remittance spending patterns of households over a five-year period from 2019 to 2023. About 75 percent of households allocated remittances to everyday food expenses. Remittances were also heavily used to cover non-food and health expenses, 41 and 36 percent, respectively. Asset-poor households, income poor households, and hungry households were more likely to spend remittances on everyday food and non-food expenses, education, and loan repayment. Compared to 2020, in 2023 households increased their remittance spending on home improvement, construction of new residences, and debt repayment. Combining MMA and MHWS data we investigate the characteristics associated with receiving remittances. Daughters of household heads are more likely to send remittances. Migrants with children are less likely to send remittances. Migrants aged younger than 18 are less likely to send remittances while migrants older than 40 are more likely to send remittances. Migrants with lower education are less likely to send remittances. Those migrating for employment and with work agreements are more likely to send remittances. Finally, remittances play a crucial role in improving household welfare. A final set of regressions reveal that receiving remittances is positively associated with key welfare indicators, including food security, dietary diversity, and poverty reduction.